Sister Ray didn't seem much better than when it was Selectadisc when I went there to be honest. And their Japanese section was definitely worse than before.

Sister Ray just seemed to have bought out Selectadisc lock stock and barrel. (Most of) the stock, the layout, the racks, even the dividers between sections are totally unchanged. Sister Ray's problem always seemed to be that they specialised in a few areas and totally neglected everything else, for instance they were always crap for most US post punk stuff. I really hope that the old Selectadisc isn't just going to slump down to the old Sister Ray's level.

i'd say selectadisc is feeling the bite of the internet, as they seem to be pushing dvds a lot more now, and also they've made a lot of space for vinyl. and like iain says the jap section is rubbish. it only consists of boredoms/AMT/Merzbow/melt banana now

Do you think the flow of decent Jap stuff into London has gone down though? Rough Trade doesn't seem to stock as much as it once did either (outside of the above mentioned boredoms/AMT/Merzbow/melt banana).

i'd say selectadisc is feeling the bite of the internet, as they seem to be pushing dvds a lot more now, and also they've made a lot of space for vinyl. and like iain says the jap section is rubbish. it only consists of boredoms/AMT/Merzbow/melt banana now

Do you think the flow of decent Jap stuff into London has gone down though? Rough Trade doesn't seem to stock as much as it once did either (outside of the above mentioned boredoms/AMT/Merzbow/melt banana).

yeah, rough trade got worse, but has recently got better. their jap section isn't something to write home about, but it is still better than selectadisc's.
and they seem to have completely stopped selling NZ stuff.
but it is about the only place in london to buy raincoats CDs